


Forget

by sauvignonfierce



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Billy's dead, I'm Sorry, M/M, Steve and Robin have been friends all summer, Uhhhh I was drunk and sad when I wrote this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-15
Updated: 2019-07-15
Packaged: 2020-06-28 16:52:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19816477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sauvignonfierce/pseuds/sauvignonfierce
Summary: Steve reflects on the death of Billy Hargrove.





	Forget

Billy was beautiful. That’s how Steve remembered him. His dark eyelashes, his obscenely pink mouth and his golden curls were the things Steve thought about at night, curled up in bed as sobs wracked his body. He remembered Billy’s fists smashing into his face, cutting open his skin until he was swollen and misshapen. He remembered the gentle kisses only a few months later, his tongue leaving hot traces down his neck. He remembered Billy’s body lying cold in the mall. 

Eleven had told him everything. Sitting at Billy’s grave one afternoon, the sun shining down on them. She told him about the wave. 

“Seven feet,” she said, eyes staring at the headstone. William Hargrove. 

“Seven feet,” he repeated. He couldn’t look at it. Beloved son and brother. Beloved. He would laugh later, thinking about Billy’s father choosing that word from a list in some funeral home, overstuffed with flowers and coffins. 

“I’m sorry.” Eleven laid her hand on his tentatively, unsure how to act in this situation. He squeezed her small hand in his, silently telling her to go. Head down, she walked through the sea of stones to Mike, who was waiting beyond the fence. Robin was there, waiting just out of ear shot, chewing on her thumb as she watched her best friend. 

She sank down into the warm grass, pulling her knees up to her chest and laying her head on his shoulder. 

“You okay, dingus?” She asked softly. He almost laughed, but let the sound die in the back of his throat. 

“No,” he answered honestly. She let a few tears fall from her eyes onto the sleeve of his shirt. She wasn’t crying because Billy was dead, not really. She was crying because she had seen Steve absolutely destroyed after. She had seen him, gasping out sobs over Billy’s body, pushing back his hair and asking him to ‘please please just get up’. No one talked about it when it happened. Steve and Billy weren’t friends, they all knew that. But they had all seen them together when they thought no one was looking. Robin had never warmed to Billy, never understood what Steve saw in him. 

He told her about Billy later. He told her that his father was a bastard who had torn Billy’s childhood away violently. Billy never recovered, never truly became who he should have been. Robin let Steve imagine, when they were drunk and sad. She let him talk about the future they would never have. Living in New York, or Los Angeles. Where they could really be together, where they could hold hands in the open and love each other in the way that burst from their hearts when they were alone. It was never going to happen, not when Billy alive and not now that Billy was dead. 

“You’ll be okay,” she said, looping her arm through Steve’s. She watched him, her face still pressed against his shoulder. His eyes were dull and distant. He wasn’t there anymore. Something had died when Billy was taken. The Mind Flayer may have snuffed out the life of Billy Hargrove, but also killed Steve Harrington. 

That night, he got drunk. He wasn’t the same fun drunk she used to love. He didn’t climb onto a table to announce a drinking game or loudly sing off key to some song on the radio. Now he slurred his words and screamed. He screamed about the boy he loved, the one who had been taken from him. She tried not to burst into tears as she watched his face grow red and tired from the exertion of remembering. At Billy’s grave, one month after the paramedics had wheeled the body out of the mall courtyard, all Robin could do was squeeze his arm in hers. 

“You’ll be okay,” she said again, voice shaking. His shoulders jerked and a mangled cry escaped his lips. 

“I won’t,” he said. “I won’t.” His mind was swimming with Billy. Billy above him, sweating and glistening as they fucked in the back of his car. Billy below him as they made out in Steve’s bed. It was always hot and too aggressive until Steve slowed things down, let them both enjoy what they shouldn’t be doing. 

If he was okay, if he let himself heal from this death and find happiness in his life, he might forget. He might forget the way that Billy would laugh, deep and throaty into the crook of Steve’s neck as they lay in bed. He might forget the hard lines of Billy’s back as he pulled his shirt back on and Steve watched, sleep threatening to claim him before Billy was out the door. He might forget that Billy was beautiful. If he was okay, he might forget. He didn’t want to forget. He never wanted to forget. 


End file.
